This invention relates to an embroidery machine. More particularly, this invention relates to an embroidery machine which makes it possible to produce embroidery designs automatically on a suitable woven support.
It is well known that embroidery work is usually very intricate and has to be carried out by specialists. Consequently, attempts have been made to automate the embroidery work by adopting digitization techniques known in other fields of activity. However, the digitization of embroidered designs having highly diverse forms, with several thread colors and with variable thread concentrations, is very costly and requires the use of complicated equipment involving a high capital outlay. Moreover, if it is desired to be able to modify the castoff of the needle or needles, and the orientation of the thread in the embroidered design, automation by the technique described above becomes practically impossible with the technical means available at the present time.
The object of the present invention is to provide a new embroidery machine which makes it possible to produce embroidery designs automatically in accordance with a design stored in a memory, taking into account all of the parameters which apply when manual embroidery is carried out.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a very fast embroidery machine which makes it possible to execute, at a variable speed, the following relative needle/fabric movements: movements in the X and Y axes, angular rotation and needle cast-off.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide an embroidery machine which automatically executes the embroidery designs stored on a storage medium by electronic and mechanical means; and which records the movements of an embroidery specialist who executes, as a model, the embroidery design to be produced automatically by the machine.